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Another Hubless Bicycle Concept, Except This One Rocks

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There are lots of hubless bike concepts that we’ve posted, but this one was actually made, has a belt drive, was ridden and has a cool video to prove it. Plus, just based on looks, it could ever so easily be made into a folding bike for campus and city livin’. Here’s the blurb on it from Makezine:

The aim was to use a hubless wheel to create a compact bicycle, with the benefits of a large wheel and belt drive.Hubless wheels have appeared in bicycle concepts already, and were first invented by Sbarro. However, few concepts have made it to prototype and when only used for aesthetic purposes, the disadvantage of extra cost out weights the visual gain. Lunartic uses the hubless for a reason; to house the working parts, reducing the wheel base but not sacrificing conventional riding geometry. Lunartic is supposed to be as compact as possible without folding or being awkward to ride, however there is the potential for the front wheel to fold up into the rear or for that space to be used for a laptop back, motor or dynamo.

See it in action: Video after the break…

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Rob
Rob
12 years ago

They’ll need to incorprate and I9 freehub into the design. Best sound ever. Nice song too.

IdeaStormer Jorge
IdeaStormer Jorge
12 years ago

Does it come in carbon?

Nice to see the hubless bike make it out of the design phase and into some mock ups. Need one with a UCI compliant front wheel.

topmounter
topmounter
12 years ago

Spare yourself the agony and press mute when the video starts playing… there is no audio discussing the bike, just some awful “music”.

uglyyeti
uglyyeti
12 years ago

First the double crust stuffed pizza and now the hubless wheel – Sbarro is truly the da Vinci of our time.

locopoco
locopoco
12 years ago

I don’t think this is anything I would like to ride. The concept is cool “hub less”, but other than it looks cool (only the rear of the bike), it brings nothing new to the table. The geometry seems (from video) unstable……… it seems like it works like a fixie and the front wheel is not something I would like or use. Why would I need to make the wheelbase shorter unless it is unstable or I don’t like the current wheelbase “norm”….. which I don’t. Anyways, maybe it will save weight………. but it looks like it is way to far to be the new best thing!! My two cents……………….

Adam
Adam
12 years ago

Rather than hubless, doesn’t this just have a REALLY big hub, just slightly smaller than the rim diameter? Seems heavy, although it may open up new options for drivetrains and suspension design.

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